John Dickens

Edition 412 done and dusted

We lead on the £20bn SEND time bomb from this week’s budget bedlam

Inside the country’s biggest academy rebroker

The trust asking pupils for engagement solutions

No more leadership heroes

What Ofsted grade reform means for flagship scheme entry

All eyes on whether the budget tomorrow does anything to provide some relief for councils with multi-billion deficits ...

Bournemouth council suggests in council minutes that government is looking at options to announce before Xmas

Council facing £183m SEND deficit warns of ‘devastating consequences’ A cash-strapped council facing a £183 million SEND black hole is warning ministers the deficit is “forcing” them to make “impossible financial decisions” with "devastating consequences”, ahead of tomo...

What a mess

Bournemouth council faces £183m SEND deficit, and £10m in interest costs to finance the debt .... paid from its general fund (made up of council tax, business rates etc)

It wants to use high needs cash to pay the debt instead, which would hit schools

schoolsweek.co.uk/council-faci...

If anyone wants to do a review of the feature for us then do get in touch with me!

(All reviews are done with a critical eye - no free PR)

England should have set 300-plus there. Really disappointing batting

Oz huge favourites now, bowlers going to have to be perfect again for England to win

May be time to revisit that…

Ah man 🫣 🏏

Such an interesting article by Cathie Paine from @reach2trust.bsky.social Great for the sector to hear from larger trusts on the realities of how they make and manage change.

Well that was a good decision. What a start to the series

Apology accepted

🪾🪾🪾🤣

🏏🏏🏏

Don’t speak too soon

Eurgh

Worth it for that Brook six alone

Decamped to the living room for second session. Feels very optimistic but there we go

Also, not sure what’s worse: England’s wafty top order or these atrocious weight transfer graphic things

Woke up a bit earlier and been watching from the fourth over 😭

Going for the start of second session, and all I’m asking for is for England to not be 80-5

School PFI firm 'to liquidate' amid row over unfinished work The firm overseeing England’s biggest school PFI contract is reportedly going into liquidation, with millions of pounds of building repairs work outstanding

!!!

Big story in the country's biggest schools PFI deal, which ended last month

The PFI firm is going into liquidation, with millions of pounds worth of school repairs still outstanding

schoolsweek.co.uk/pfi-firm-in-...

Edition 411 done and dusted:

Investigation: Councils don’t know how many home educated kids are under child protection enquiries

Scoop: PFI firm in multi-million pound schools repair row goes bust

Longread on new inspections

Plus: attendance awareness courses, GAG pooling, MAT mergers

gosh!

We delved into this earlier this year

SENCos will be central to any government plan to make mainstream schools more inclusive. But are their roles even sustainable now?

Great investigation from @lydiach.bsky.social

schoolsweek.co.uk/burnt-out-an...

Those AI attendance reports have started well ...

Thank you @schoolsweek.bsky.social for highlighting this - a really thorough and well researched article.

Some very worrying stats here. Serious questions for government and Capita about why it is taking so long to process remedy statements stemming from the McCloud judgment. Can’t imagine the anguish of already-retired teachers and leaders waiting for missing money

Edition 410 done and dusted

Scoop: Ofsted consultation analysis row takes a new turn 👀

Solutions: teacher interns?

Investigation: thousands of teachers potentially due better pension die before outcome

Rise in pupils educated at home causes exams centre blockage

Attendance: AI-generated targets to be set for all schools AI-generated targets will be set for all schools in England, government has announced, as it looks to crackdown on absence rates.

🤖 Ministers will use AI to set minimum attendance targets for every school in England

Targets will not be published, or be given to Ofsted - but failure to improve will result in a referral to RISE teams

schoolsweek.co.uk/ai-to-set-mi...

Warning over grammar’s plan to open ‘affiliate’ schools overseas A grammar school is looking to raise 'significant funds' by opening affiliate schools overseas, a market dominated by the independent sector

Great to see wider pick up of this big story on a state school opening a fee-pay paying school abroad

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...

Schools Week broke the story over a year ago: schoolsweek.co.uk/warning-over...

‘Savings platform’ plan to help schools boost reserves Government thinks vision will ease school funding woes by 'unlocking' the sector's 'substantial reserves'

The latest government plan to help schools balance their budgets:

Provide support to help them get better returns on their collective £6bn of funding in reserves

schoolsweek.co.uk/savings-plat...

The irony of this coming as government wonders why assistant head numbers have risen so much and suggests schools look at making savings in those teams ...
schoolsweek.co.uk/can-schools-...